writer

James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket

Although he spent a great deal of his life abroad, James Baldwin always remained a quintessentially American writer. Whether he was working in Paris or Istanbul, he never ceased to reflect on his experience as a black man in white America. In numerous essays, novels, plays and public speeches, the eloquent voice of James Baldwin […]

Unanswered Prayers: The Life and Times of Truman Capote

Throughout his career, Truman Capote remained one of America’s most controversial and colorful authors, combining literary genius with a penchant for the glittering world of high society. Though he wrote only a handful of books, his prose styling was impeccable, and his insight into the psychology of human desire was extraordinary. His flamboyant and well-documented […]

Edgar Allan Poe: Terror of the Soul

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow;–vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore– For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore– Nameless here for […]

Willa Cather: The Road Is All

The Road is All Willa Cather wrote about the lives of early Nebraska pioneers in such books as O PIONEERS! (1913) and MY ANTONIA (1918). This is an interview with the filmmakers of WILLA CATHER: THE ROAD IS ALL: Producer/Writer, Christine Lesiak, and Producer/Director, Joel Geyer. Q: Discuss the collaborative process between the two of […]

Willa Cather: The Road Is All

by Kathleen Norris “No romantic novel ever written in America, by man or woman, is one half so beautiful as MY ANTONIA.” — H. L. Mencken In the mid-1970s, not long after I had moved from New York City to Lemmon, South Dakota, I attended a 90th birthday party for a woman who had been […]

Willa Cather: The Road Is All

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Winter Dreams

The following is an excerpt from the essay “The Crack-Up,” reprinted from The Crack-Up, a compilation of articles written by F. Scott Fitzgerald and published in one book by New Directions Publishing. These articles were written during Fitzgerald’s later years, between 1931 and 1937, when he was ill, drunk, in debt, and unable to write […]

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Winter Dreams

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Winter Dreams

Filmmaker DeWitt Sage answers questions about his film F. SCOTT FITZGERALD: WINTER DREAMS. Q: Do you agree with the several end-of-millennium surveys that rank F. Scott Fitzgerald as the most important or one of the most important American writers of the 20th century? DeWitt Sage: No, I personally don’t for the simple reason that I […]

George Lucas: Heroes, Myths and Magic

“I’ve always tried to be aware of what I say in my films, because all of us who make motion pictures are teachers — teachers with very loud voices.” Based on the classic story of a young man’s battle with the forces of evil, George Lucas’s 1977 film STAR WARS introduced a modern myth to […]